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Accessing dynamic URLs from the AEL in OMNIbus Web GUI - part 1

It is quite common to want to open a web page from the AEL, where the URL is formed dynamically, based upon the details of the event which was selected. The easiest way to do this is using a Web GUI "URL" tool, where one or more field values from the event are dynamically substituted into the URL string. This works fine, but the web page is opened in a new browser window or tab. In this blog entry I will describe how to configure Web GUI 7.3.1 (which uses TIP 2.1) to open a dynamically-generated URL on the same page as the AEL within TIP.

I will use the fictitious example of a TIP page containing the AEL on one side, and pages from an in-house inventory tracking system on the other side. When I run a particular tool from the AEL I want to update the URL being displayed on the page in order to view inventory details of the selected node.

The first step is to define a Web GUI tool which can be run from the AEL in order to open a dynamic URL. To do this, open the Web GUI tool editor and define a new tool. Set the tool type to "Script" and then enter a script of this format this under "Script Commands":

/* Form dynamic URL for inventory system, passing in the Node value from the selected event */var address = 'http://inv-host.myhost.com:8082/inventory?node={@Node}';

The purpose of this script tool is to broadcast a TIP event, passing through the dynamic URL as a parameter.

After creating this new tool we add it to the AEL alerts menu (with an item labelled "Inventory Details", in this example).

Our next step is to define a new TIP page (via the "Page Management" facility) which contains an AEL portlet and a TIP "Web Widget" portlet, side-by-side. We can configure the portlet preferences for each, if we wish; for example, so that the AEL uses a specified filter and view, and so that the web widget uses a specified starting URL (for us, this will be the home page of our inventory website).

Now, if I open this new page, I can scroll through the list of events until I find an event where the related node is of interest. I right-click on that event, and select the "Inventory Details" tool from the pop-up menu:

The tool causes a TIP event to be broadcast, which might be received from any open portlets. The TIP Web Widget portlet is able to listen for events with a name "http://ibm.com/TIP#DisplayURL", and if detected, will grab the specified "URL" parameter value, and update itself to display that page.

In our example, this causes the details for the selected node to be displayed on the page:

In part 2 of this blog entry (coming soon), I will describe how to configure Web GUI to open a dynamic URL in a different TIP tab, rather than on the same page.